Who Are You Anyway: The Early Years
by LysPotter
Summary: Dumbledore knew about Peter. Chronicles the childhood and first two Hogwarts years of Lily and James's twins, Amanda and Natalie. SBxOC, RLxOC, possibly HPxHG?
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: Yah you pesky thing move away and don't come back! Everyone knows I don't own Harry Potter! In short, don't own, don't sue. You can't win much anyway!

A/N: Anyone who might know this story--I rewrote Lys And Lynn: Who Are You Anyway and came up with this. It's more childhood, less Hogwarts so far. I endeavored not to make it too Mary-Sue...tell me how well I'm succeeding.

On with the story! (Just a Prologue, they won't all be this short)

**Late November 1984**

Natalie Louise Potter smiled at her father, James Andrew Potter, as they walked down the park path. Amanda Meghan Potter swung Lily Anne Potter's hand back and forth, giggling at the birds in front of them as she walked with her mother. The two-year-old girls were blissfully unaware of the fact that their parents were (quite understandably) presumed to be dead and that their older brother, Harry James Potter, aka The Boy Who Lived, was in the custody of magic-hating Vernon and Petunia Dursley, their aunt and uncle through their mother.

"Mama," Amanda giggled. Lily Potter smiled absently, mind working furiously. James picked Natalie up and twirled her around. The little girl screamed with laughter as James set her back down. He looked questioningly at Lily, who waved his concern away. She thought back to the Halloween of 1981.

Lily and James _should_ have been dead. A few months after they'd gone under the Fidelius Charm, Sirius Black, James's best friend, had convinced them to change their Secret-Keeper from him to Peter Pettigrew, another of James's friends. They had (rather stupidly, she saw now) consented. Soon after, Albus Dumbledore, the headmaster of Hogwarts, had informed them that Peter was in fact a servant of Lord Voldemort and was waiting to hand over the Potters. He had received this information because he was the head of the Order of the Phoenix (a secret society that was focused on defeating Lord Voldemort). Lord Voldemort, a freakishly powerful evil wizard, was on the warpath to "purify" the magical people, ridding it of all Muggleborn witches (Lily) and wizards (or magical people with non-magic parents) and anyone else he considered impure. Peter had somehow agreed with the madman's views.

Natalie gazed up at her mother, who leaned down and offered the little girl a pig-a-back ride. She accepted. Lily smiled and straightened as the family continued down the path, James now lost in thought as he led Amanda down the path, unknowingly considering the same subject as Lily: Their almost-deaths and the circumstances surrounding them, which James would give anything to change.

James had been all for changing Secret-Keepers right then and killing Peter for lying so severely to them, but the ever-sensible Lily had restrained him. Professor Dumbledore had already concocted a plan. He charmed the Potters' friend Mary, who occasionally doubled as Harry's babysitter, to look exactly like Lily—she had volunteered. Her husband had volunteered to masquerade as James, while the real James and Lily found a good hiding place. When the Dark Lord had come to call on Halloween, it had not been Lily and James that died for Harry. It had been Mary and Matthew Arthurs, other old school friends, who had also loved Harry so much that they'd die for him. Not that Lily and James wouldn't have. In fact, when James had thought about it, if Dumbledore had not insisted that he needed them for the Order, he would have easily done so. Now, though, the family had to masquerade (in public) as Andrew, Anne, Amanda, and Natalie McDonald. James had dyed his unruly hair brown, and Lily had dyed hers blonde. Amanda and Natalie were too young to have any sort of distinctive hair, but they appeared to be heading for the black hair also. Their eyes were Lily's brilliant emerald green. The young family regretted the loss of their son, but it was necessary for the wizarding world (and especially their son) to remain safe and, in Harry's case, anonymous.

"Andrew?" Lily asked tentatively. James shook his head, holding out his arms to his little daughter. Amanda giggled and rushed into her father's waiting arms. The little girl said clearly, "Daddy, fast!" James sighed, looked at Lily, who shrugged. James set off at top speed down the path, the baby now on his back chortling as the wind rushed over her face. Lily grimaced. "You're raising me a couple of Quidditch players," she complained. James just smiled, his mind skipping to the matter of his young daughter. Who was she exactly? She wasn't Amanda McDonald, though that was her public façade. She was Amanda Potter. No one and nothing else.

"Daddy, stop!" the twenty-five-month-old cried out. James slowed to a stop, letting the girl off his back. Lily took Amanda's hand and James took Natalie's. They continued on down the path.

When Natalie and Amanda attended Hogwarts, they'd have to go as Natalie and Amanda McDonald. James knew that. But why was it so hard to accept? After all, he himself was acting the part of someone who had never existed. James often wondered when exactly they were planning to tell the wizarding world that they'd survived. So far, only Dumbledore knew their secret…And Lily seemed to be planning to keep it that way. He sighed imperceptibly and focused his attention back on his daughters.

A/N: SO whatcha think? TELL ME!

Luv, LysPotter


	2. 1 Life Goes On

Disclaimer: Repetition is good for little kids...which I hope you're not. Seeing as little kids shouldn't be reading Harry Potter fanfiction at this hour...Especially in the USA. Anyhoo. J.K. Rowling lives in England...IN A BLOODY MANSION! I'm living in an Australian rental house...Get the picture? No ownie. Please don't sue me. I spent all my money sponsoring people for the 40 hour famine and on chips in the canteen.

On to the story, in which we deal with inquisitive four-year-olds, a crying Lily, and an emotional James with a lot of paperwork.

**Chapter One: Life Goes On, Even in the Stickiest Situations**

**Two Years Later**

"Mummy, who that?" a four-year-old, dyed-brown-haired Natalie (she _was_ truly raven-haired, just like her father) asked Lily, pointing to the picture of baby Harry, his pregnant aunt Meghan—James's deceased younger sister—and Meghan's husband Sirius in the photo album on the Healer's lap. Amanda, anticipating a story, came and sat on the couch next to her mother.

"That's your Uncle Padfoot, your Auntie Meghan, and your brother Harry, sweetheart," Lily told Natalie, who looked curiously up at her mother.

"I have a brother?" she asked, confused. "Where's he? Anna has a big sister, and she lives at her house. I never met Harry." She spoke of one of their good friends, Anna Spinnet, the younger sister of Alicia Spinnet.

"Oh, your brother had to go away to live with your auntie. I'm not sure what to tell you now, but when you're older, you'll understand."

"Wanna know now!" Natalie and Amanda complained together.

Lily looked helplessly at a watching James. He shrugged, which Lily interpreted as a "go ahead" shrug. "Okay, Nat, Amanda, before you two were born, when Mummy and Daddy were still young, we figured out that we loved each other and got married."

"Married?" the little girls chorused.

"When you get all dressed up in your fancy robes and kiss your favorite person in the whole world," James offered. "I married your mum, and she married me—it happened at the same time since we loved each other and were all excited about it. You two and your brother are my other favorite people, but I'm not going to marry you."

"Thank you. Now, when we got married, there was this big bad wizard that was coming after us. He called himself Lord Voldemort—"

"That's a funny name," Natalie laughed. Amanda laughed too.

"It is, isn't it?" Lily said, laughing along with Natalie and Amanda. "His name's really Tom. And he was out to get all the people whose parents were Muggles, like Mummy—their parents weren't witches and wizards. And then, a funny lady who wears too much jewelry said that he was going to come for our little baby. The little baby was born in the middle of the summer. So we went and hid from the bad wizard, so he couldn't find us and get the baby. We named the baby Harry, because it was a boy. So later, Harry turned one and we had a party for his birthday, like we do on yours every year. Then Uncle Albus—you know Uncle Albus, he's the one with the long beard—said he didn't want us to get in Voldemort's way, and told us we'd have to find someone who liked Harry to watch him for some nights. Two nice people volunteered. If you ever see them after you die, call them Aunt Mary and Uncle Matt. When Voldemort came to visit, he decided he didn't want to be nice and k-killed Mary and Matt—" Lily was crying. James sat next to her on the couch and slipped an arm around her shoulders, soothing her and hugging her one-armed.

"You see," James picked up when everyone was calm again, although Amanda (the more sensitive one) had spent a few minutes asking her mother if she was all right, "we were very good friends with Mary and Matt—they went to school with us and grew up with Daddy. We miss them now.

"But we were sitting in the basement, and we heard Voldemort attack. I didn't want your mum in danger, so I made her stay there with me. But he killed Aunt Mary and Uncle Matt. Harry survived somehow, and he got bundled off to your Aunt Petunia's—even though we tried to get Uncle Albus to let him come here with us.

"So now he's growing up with your Aunt Petunia, your Uncle Vernon, and your cousin Dudley. What do you think of that, girls, hmm?" Natalie looked simply pensive for a few moments. Amanda looked back at the picture as if to see her brother, who looked almost exactly like her in her own pictures.

"Oh. What happened to him? Uncle Padfoot?" she asked. James shook his head vehemently, determined to let Lily do this one.

"Daddy doesn't like to talk about this one. Uncle Padfoot is his best friend. People thought that Uncle Padfoot told Voldemort how to find us…that he tattled on us. But he couldn't tell Voldemort where we lived because of a charm. The only person who could was a man named Wormtail, who was one of our friends at one point. He told Voldemort how to find us. And your Uncle Padfoot was mad and tried to fight Wormtail. But somehow, he ended up killing Wormtail and the rest of the people on the street. So now he's in a really long time-out with some mean things watching him. He's not going to get out."

"So is Uncle Padfoot mean?" Natalie asked, with simple toddler logic. "Do you want him to be in time-out?"

"No, Uncle Padfoot just made some mistakes," James said. "Just like Mummy and Daddy make mistakes sometimes. I don't think he really killed Wormtail. But don't tell anyone that, because they all don't like Uncle Padfoot."

Amanda cocked her head in the time-honored gesture of a confused toddler. "But Daddy, why don't they like him? He's being so nice to my big brother Harry here." She looked at her mother. "Why don't they see he's nice?"

"They don't know him very well, sweetheart. If they did, they wouldn't put him in time-out, they'd let him explain first." Lily tried to explain Crouch's mistake to the four-year-old.

"Oh. And who's Auntie Meghan?" Natalie asked. Amanda nodded, interested.

"Auntie Meghan was Daddy's sister," James explained, trying to keep his trembling voice from cracking. "Auntie Meghan grew up with Daddy and Uncle Padfoot, and she was Mummy's best friend. She was really smart and she liked to play with Harry after he was born. She loved Uncle Sirius, and Uncle Sirius and Auntie Meghan were married. They had a little girl named Ashley two months before Aunt Mary and Uncle Matt died. And then they thought Mummy and Daddy died, so Meghan—Meghan, she—Meghan fought—" James couldn't say it.

"Meghan fought a really mean person, but that person was feeling better than her, so they beat Auntie Meghan." Lily slipped an arm around James's shoulders, giving him a half-hug. "They killed your Auntie Meghan, girls, and your cousin Ashley. You're never going to meet her…she would have loved you two. Your Auntie Meghan is watching over us right now."

"And I bet she's smiling," James said.

"That's good," Amanda said matter-of-factly. "Will we ever see Uncle Padfoot and Harry again? I think I might like them," she said simply. "I think I might have liked Auntie Meghan, too."

"I'm sure you would have, Amanda," James said, smiling, as he patted his daughter's head. "I'm sure you would have."

Lily just yawned to mask the tears in her eyes. "I'm sure it's time for little girls to be in bed."

"No!" Natalie yelled. "Not bedtime, Mummy! Five more minutes!"

"Come on, Natalie, Mandy, we just had a bedtime story, now it's time for bed," James said with a shooing motion toward the stairs. "Go before the Daddy monster has to come get you and take you there."

The little girls squealed and ran up the stairs. "I'm going, I'm going, Daddy! No monster today, Daddy!" Amanda called down the stairs.

"Good girls," said James. As soon as Natalie and Amanda disappeared into their bedroom at the top of the stairs, he headed for the kitchen. "Merlin, I need a cup of coffee. I've got all that paperwork to look at before tomorrow."

Soon after, Lily came down the stairs. "Homework, Prongs?" she teased at the sight of him looking over piles of papers.

"Kingsley will absolutely kill me if I don't get all this filled out by tomorrow. He gave some of it to me Friday last week. I don't have any more excuses. Not good ones anyway." He wrote something down on a page, turned it over, and continued to work. He would stop every once in a while to take a drink. Lily pretended she couldn't hear him sniffling.

Lily sighed and pulled out her own stack of papers. "What's in the bag for this weekend? Oh, Nat and Amanda's wizarding kindergarten immunization cards, papers for that patient with the teapot attached to his nose…what else, what else? Papers from the preschool, they're doing great as always…ah well. Nothing really important otherwise. Oh, and James?"

"Hmm?"

"I'm on call next weekend. If something comes up, you'll have to look after Nat and Mandy. It hasn't been my turn for a few weeks now, and Nadine's getting tired of being on call."

"No more good excuses for you either, Lily flower?" James asked, now halfway through his mound of paper. "Never letting my work accumulate again, even if my daughters are starting to get a handle on their magic, their speech, and their story. Kingsley's sent me three urgent memos this week…seems we've got a crazy one on the loose."

"What's he doing?"

"She. Don't know what's wrong with this woman, but she's Vanishing all the Muggle telephone booths she can find after she broke into the Ministry and nearly got arrested for attacking Fudge. Her excuse was his bad ideals."

"She has a point," Lily muttered. "Let's see…'affliction of patient'—what do you think this is about, idiots? The man had a bloody teapot attached to his nose! Although how he managed to do that, I'll never know."

After half an hour of steadfast work, Lily was finished. "All done, love."

"Good for you. Can you stay down here a minute? I want to talk to you." Lily, about to get up, settled back down.

"What is it, James?" she asked, a little worried. "Is something wrong? Is it the girls? Work? Voldemort?"

"No, none of that. Don't you think, though, that it's a little odd that Meghan would—would lose? Don't you remember her at school? I know I saw her in the field. No Dark Lord wannabe would beat her…I don't know what to think anymore. But I really don't think she was that easily beaten. Not Meghan."

Lily put her hand over James's. "James, I know. Any minute Meghan wasn't reading, she was practicing her dueling. You remember that dueling club we had under Blackthorne? She won almost every match. Against you and Remus, it was always a draw. I think she lost to Sirius on purpose, but she never lost to anyone else. Sometimes I wonder. I wonder if she's not wandering around somewhere, her memory wiped and her clothes all torn up, maybe even with little Ashley. She would have died for her. I wonder if they're not alive. She could be anywhere."

"I know. I'd give anything to figure out if they have her body somewhere. They didn't have it for the funeral. We were there." James looked up, tears in his eyes. "I know it's been five years, but goddamn it, Lily, she wouldn't up and die on me! I know she probably thought Sirius was lower than scum at that point, and she thought we were dead, but you know she wouldn't give up! She never gave up. She was the one that pulled Sirius out of giving up that one summer. Never! You know my sister. Any hope—any hope at all. Remus is still alive out there somewhere. She wouldn't let him be the only one. This isn't right! Something's wrong here, Lily, and I'm going to figure out what it is, damn it!"

"James. James, love, I know what you're feeling. I know. I remember when—when we heard that Jane's entire family was mur—murdered. I remember what it feels like. I remember when—when Meghan and Ashley died. I remember, James. I know. I know there's something wrong. I know she's got to be out there somewhere. If we're still here, she's still here. You hold on to that, because I'm holding on to it too. If we believe in it, it will work. You've got to pull this together, love. Come on." She patted his hand, knowing he didn't want her to soothe the tears that were running thick and fast down his face. She didn't realize the same was happening to her. She swallowed and tried to smile. "Need anything before I go up to bed? Long day tomorrow."

"Um, yes," he tried to recover, wiping away his tears with the back of his hand and straightening. "Hand me the coffeepot and my wand. I'll be up a while yet. Curse this bloody paperwork. I want to retire sooner rather than later if it requires less paperwork."

"Hmm, what should I do to it…Jelly Legs, Tarantallegra—or how about Rictusempra? Yeah, that sounds like a good one."

"Lily, I think I'm rubbing off on you."

"So? Who cares? There you are, love. 'Night." They kissed and she headed up the stairs. James sighed heavily, swallowed his tears and chalked down another signature on the dotted line. _Meghan, I know you're out there. Don't leave us here all alone, little sister. We can't do this if you can't be here. Miss you, and I hope you can find us._

**_A/N_**: this refuses to do those tidy little lines. You'll have to pick out the author notes for yourself. Meghan is not lost forever, do not fret. She loves you all.

M: Shut up. I can talk for myself. And quite frankly, I think you should all nose out. Don't believe everything the government says. It's good advice.

LP: Right. Well, anyway, now that she's finished. Next update will be up momentarily. Luv ya all,

LysPotter


	3. 2 They're Growing Up

Disclaimer: As much as I love Harry Potter, I do not own it and do not aspire to own it. It costs a helluva lot of money. I'm not stupid...although I do not vouch for my characters there. Don't own it! JKR owns it, and she is the one rolling in the cash...not me.

Previously, Meghan Potter-Black is suspected to truly be alive, James misses his surrogate family, and the twins are inquisitive. In reverse order. On with the story.

**Chapter 3: They're Growing Up**, in which the twins get older and more mischievous. Harry goes to Hogwarts, and life goes on for the Potter/McDonalds.

**Saturday, October 28, 1989**

Emma Dobbs, Anna Spinnet, Alyssa de Leur, and Mary Elizabeth Lovegood sat at the "McDonalds'" kitchen table around almost-seven-year-old Natalie and Amanda. Their birthday would be in three days, but a Tuesday was inconvenient, as all the girls had school and the adults had work.

The brunettes (Emma and Anna), the blondes (Alyssa and Lily), Mary—the only redhead—and James serenaded the girls separately. _Almost_ as identical inside as out, the twins were still entirely separate people, and liked to be acknowledged as such. Both girls had been allowed to invite two of their close friends for lunch, cake, and games that day.

The twins puffed their joint seven candles out together. Alyssa giggled, her short hair bouncing, as Natalie and Amanda traded looks…they had not been trick candles this year.

"Told you Dad couldn't do the same prank three times," Amanda told her sister, her voice laden with mock-superiority. "You owe me a box of Filibuster's now, Nat," she said with wicked satisfaction. "Imagine all the fun I'll have with that—especially since you sleep late on Sundays." Natalie blanched.

"You two," Lily said, shaking her head. "Emma? Cake and ice cream for you, dear?" The bespectacled, often sedate-looking girl nodded absently, laughing at the faces Amanda was pulling at her sister's back as she talked earnestly about books to a glassy-eyed Alyssa, who would occasionally respond with a "Mm-hmm," or "yeah." Few people were as enthusiastic about books as the twins and their mother. Alyssa definitely preferred athletics to books. If asked if she would rather read or play soccer—or anything else, for that matter, that involved physical activity—it would have been no contest. But people soon learned that the best way to get the twins to leave them alone was to tune them out. They would never stop talking about their passion.

"Natalie, you're boring poor 'Lyssa to death," Anna said through a mouthful of chocolate cake. "Let her be. Besides, your mum wants to serve her cake, but she can't get her attention because she's nearly asleep." Natalie leveled her best glare at Anna.

"Well, Nat, you can't blame her for telling the truth," Amanda said matter-of-factly to her sister. "The best people to talk books with are me, Mum, and Emma. Alyssa wouldn't touch one with a ten-foot-pole if she could help it."

"You have a point," Natalie said with a rueful smile. "Sorry, Alyssa. Poke me next time I start doing it. And tell me to shut up, because I won't know if it's you or my sister poking me to be obnoxious." Amanda's innocent look fooled no one.

"Come on, girls," Lily whispered to the twins. It was the night of October 31. The eighth anniversary of their close friends' sacrifice to save Lily and James and their then-one-year-old son. The four Potters, cloaked in black, were going to Godric's Hollow cemetery. James had Amanda's arm tight in his grip as he Side-Along Apparated her away. Lily had both hands on Natalie's arm.

When they materialized in the dark graveyard, they hustled over to two stones that read "James Andrew Potter. 22 March 1957—31 October 1981. Husband, Father, Defender," and "Lily Anne Evans Potter. 26 March 1957—31 October 1981. Wife, Mother, Healer." Lily hurried to the stone bearing her name and pointed her wand at the ground it stood over. As she muttered an incantation, another person's name and birth date appeared.

"Mary Margaret Smythe Arthurs. 19 March 1956—31 October 1981. Brave Till the End. A True Friend." James did the same, to reveal a stone bearing the same for Matthew Jason Arthurs, 28 October 1955—31 October 1981.

The family sat in a semicircle, looking by the meager light of Natalie's flashlight at the two hidden stones. Each member of the family sent a message to the two heroes, wherever they were, thanking them for their courage and devotion to doing what was right.

About fifteen minutes later, using Muggle matches, Lily lit the four charmed candles they had brought with them, and one-by-one they set them on the gravestones. While they burned, they would leak the charm to make the hidden gravestones look like ground once more. It was a discovery that James and Lily had found useful…

**July 31, 1990**

It was the official date of Harry Potter's tenth birthday.

Seven-year-old Natalie and Amanda Potter sat in their shared bedroom, in the middle of the floor. Each was painting the other's toenails bright silver and chatting lightly.

"Oops. Here, hand me that cloth," Amanda told Natalie. She rubbed a bit of nail polish that had gone off the nail off the other girl's toe. "So, when do you think Uncle Albus will be here?" she asked excitedly.

"Soon, I think. Harry's birthday is only a holiday in our home," Natalie told her sister. "I don't think anyone knows his birthday besides us, except his fans with access to the wizarding web. I think we're the only ones that celebrate it with a birthday cake depicting his age. But that's okay, I guess."

"Natalie! Amanda! Uncle Albus is here!" Lily called up the stairs to the young twins. "Come on down and say hello!"

The twin girls with their dyed light-brown hair took the stairs two at a time. Natalie was wearing a pair of blue jeans and a T-shirt that displayed a smirking cat and bore the legend, "I Know I'm Smarter than You…You Don't Need to Prove It." Amanda wore a blue shirt silk-screened with a pair of Siberian tigers. There, in the living room, stood Albus Dumbledore—or, as he was known in this house, Uncle Albus.

Rushing into the kindly man's waiting arms, they hugged the venerable old professor—and close family friend—tightly. "Hi, Uncle Albus! So nice to see you!"

"Nice to see you too, Natalie, Amanda," he told them, his eyes twinkling their infamous twinkle. "I trust you are well?"

"Great!" Natalie exclaimed. "And Mum and Dad said that we really need to get to Hogwarts, because we're driving them crazy," she stage-whispered to him, while Amanda nodded confidentially.

"Natalie!" Lily exclaimed. Natalie shot her a pointed look.

"I agree, a bit. I really want to go to a real school. Anna, Katie, Lyssa and Manda and I like to talk about it when we get together."

"Which is quite often," James said with a laugh. "So, Albus, what's the verdict on this year?" he asked expectantly. Every year he asked the same question: What are we to do? Should we tell, wait, or bust Sirius out of Azkaban? The elder Potters still hadn't said anything about their suspicions about Meghan Potter Black, not even to Natalie and Amanda.

"The same as every year. Watch, and wait. Don't blow your cover." Albus sat, and a twin sat on either side of him.

"Don't you ever try for variety in your life, Albus?" James joked halfheartedly. "Come on, Professor. I miss my son—and my best friend."

"James, it's for the greater good," Lily chided. _Even if the greater good sucks and should go and boil its head. _"I miss him too, you know. I was the one that carried him for nine months. Harry, not Sirius."

"I know, I know…don't reprimand me, I just meant I want to get this out of obscurity, get Sirius out of Azkaban, and see my friends again." _And try to find my little sister. Because she's not dead, Albus, but I don't expect you to see that._

"I know, Dad, don't you think I hate lying to everyone?" Amanda asked rhetorically, trading a look with Natalie. "But Uncle Albus knows what's the best not to give Minister Fudge a good heart attack. We can't send the illustrious leader of the wizarding world into cardiac arrest. The public would rise up against him." Natalie giggled.

"I wish I could give him a heart attack," James muttered.

"Ah, don't we all," Lily said dreamily. "But we need to be nice to the incompetent idiot. Cake, Albus?"

**Sunday, September 1, 1991**

"All right, girls. What's the story this time, Natalie?" Lily asked, as if coaching her eight-year-old daughters, who were, as usual, strawberry-blonde-haired as Natalie and Amanda McDonald.

"We came to see our friend Terry Boot off to Hogwarts, because his parents couldn't make it. There was a family emergency," Natalie replied obediently. This was actually the truth—the Boots did have a family emergency.

"And if someone asks us why we're there, just say we're seeing Terry Boot off and nothing else…isn't that what you said? Terry? His grandma's sick or something, so his parents aren't coming?" Amanda asked.

"Yes, yes, you pass. Now get in the car so we can get to the station. I can't miss Harry's first getting on the Hogwarts Express."

"Such a devoted mother," James muttered to the twins. "Annoying, too, sometimes." Lily whacked him with her handbag.

"Mum, we're going to pick up bad habits," Amanda told her as the twins slid into the car. "I'll be whacking Natalie pretty soon."

"You do all ready," Natalie complained, rubbing her shoulder. "Mum should never have let us take karate—you're better than me, and it hurts!"

"That's because you didn't like it," Amanda retorted. "Said it took away time you could be reading. You're going to be a Ravenclaw, I can tell."

"Hey! You read as much as I do." Amanda shrugged, buckled her seatbelt, and continued to fill in the blanks of a crossword puzzle from the Muggle newspaper the Potters/McDonalds received every morning.

"You still like crossword puzzles?"

"Yes. What's a six-letter word for a ceramics artist?" Natalie looked at her, almost in disgust, as she pointed to herself.

"Think about it, you prat. Ceramics artist. What's another word for ceramics, Amanda?" she asked.

"Pottery—but that would be—oh!" she exclaimed. "Potter. Yes, that's it. Sorry, it's a little too early for this."

"Early? 'Manda, it's ten already. Ten o'clock. You were up at five because you wanted to see Harry."

"Well, he is my brother. And he _is_ on his first trip to Hogwarts. Aren't I allowed to be anxious?"

"No, never."

"Girls, be quiet and stop arguing," Lily said pointedly. "We're going now. James, start the car."

"Yes, ma'am," he said sharply, starting up the engine. "All aboard for King's Cross! Your mum hopes we don't hit too much traffic on a Sunday morning."

Natalie handed her mother a tape. "Mum, can you pop in the music for me? Take our minds off the traffic that Dad's going to get us into."

"'Traffic is cool'," Amanda mimicked arguing, turning in her seat as if to speak to people behind her. "'We never had anything like it when I was growing up'.

"Because you grew up—"

"—wizard, and since when have—"

"—wizards driven anywhere? They take—"

"—Floo powder."

"Yes, and my daughters are not going to be 'fascinated' with traffic—like their father," Lily told all passengers of the Potter car.

"When we're sixteen, we're going to learn how to drive in Muggle driving school, and we're _not_ going to find hectic London traffic 'interesting'," Amanda affirmed. "We'll be lucky to get there by the time the train leaves the station at this rate. Dad, traffic—especially London traffic—is not fascinating. Repeat it after me—even though you've had plenty of years to learn it by now. Traffic—"

"Amanda Meghan Potter—McDonald—whatever you want to call yourself! Shut up and let Dad drive so we can get to King's Cross in time to actually see Harry," Natalie intervened, a little worried that they wouldn't make it to the station before the Express left. "If we don't, Mum's going to throw a fit."

"Natalie Louise!" Lily chided. Amanda appeared affronted, but her twin sister saw right through the façade.

"What?" Natalie asked innocently, tossing her straight, nearly-red hair. "Isn't it the truth, Dad?" she addressed her father.

"Yes," he said flatly, no emotion crossing his face. "If we miss Harry, your mum here is going to kill me very, very dead and leave my body for the London traffic. You know, suddenly, I don't like traffic, Amanda."

"No? Good. So let's get out of here," Amanda said authoritatively. "The person in front of you just moved up about six or seven feet."

"Sorry," James muttered. "Slave-driver."

"We'll make it to King's Cross," Lily said encouragingly.

"Eventually," muttered Natalie and Amanda in unison.

"Terry!" Lily exclaimed, hugging the Boot boy like the overprotective mothering woman she was. "Your parents around?" She made the pretext of looking around. The Boots had obviously not told Terry anything but for the fact that the McDonalds would be seeing him off, because he looked a little confused as he made his statement.

"Hi, Mrs. McDonald. And my parents? Actually, no, they're not here. They said they couldn't come to the station," he said matter-of-factly, pulling his trunk over to him. "Said you would meet me here just when they pushed me through the Floo." He shrugged noncommittally. Natalie and Amanda exchanged looks.

"Sorry we're late," Lily apologized. "Andrew here liked to drive through the oppressive London traffic, and it was especially thick today."

"Just for the record, Terry, I no longer like traffic ever since Anne threatened to kill me and leave me in traffic," James defended. " By the way, you remember my daughters, Natalie and Amanda, right? They're three years younger than you, and they won't be going to Hogwarts for a good three years as well." Natalie pouted and Amanda sighed.

"But we really want to—" Amanda began.

"—go now—" Natalie continued.

"—but Mum, Dad, and Dumbledore won't let us."

"Fudge, too, I suppose—"

"—and all those old school governor types. Don't suppose you'd be a chum and sneak us there in your trunk?" Amanda asked hopefully.

James shook his head at them. "I remember you," Terry nodded with a grin. "You're the twins, aren't you?"

"Each born within ten minutes of the other," Amanda confirmed with a smile. Terry looked mildly interested.

"And you can finish each other's sentences. By the way, Mr. and Mrs. McDonald, I'm not sure how to get on the platform—Mum and Dad didn't tell me. So I waited for you."

"Just walk straight at the brick part between platform nine and platform ten. That will take you through a magical portal, straight to platform nine-and-three-quarters and the Hogwarts Express," Lily told him with a smile.

"Thanks, Mrs. McDonald," he said, smiling nervously, to the falsely blonde woman. Lily and James pushed him and his luggage toward the platform.

He walked through—and disappeared. Amanda and Natalie were very clear on what happened, but it was definitely more exciting to see it actually happening in front of them. "Whoa," Amanda breathed, but a moment later, Lily pulled her through the wall as James followed, leading Natalie by the hand.

The large, shining, crimson Hogwarts Express stood there, resplendent. Natalie's hazel-via-colored-contact eyes—the girls' vision wasn't very good—were enormous. "Oh my God, it's _huge_," she whispered reverently.

Terry, for his part, was all ready stowing his luggage on the train. Lily and James waved to their friends' son. Natalie yelled, "'Bye, Terry!" and Amanda called out, "Have a good year!"

And, at that moment, who should appear at the platform gate, but Harry James Potter, walking quietly behind a crowd of Weasleys.

A hand flew to Lily's mouth. James gave a stifled gasp. Amanda and Natalie exchanged a look of interest—and caution to keep the secret—well, secret.

The boy was recognizable by his mop of untidy black hair—so similar to James's own, though James's was currently brown. When he looked up to answer a question, they could see bright green eyes behind round, wire-framed glasses just like his father had once worn before he discovered the miracle of contacts. Lily was mesmerized. James was carefully looking at things around Harry so as not to attract attention. Natalie and Amanda reached up to ruffle their hair at the same time. That was a gesture they made when nervous or remembering their father's/brother's messy hair. Theirs got messy easily as well; but fortunately, it also looked _almost _good on them, just like Harry's and James's hair fit them.

"Er, Anne, we should be getting home," James croaked after a few minutes. Lily tore her eyes away from where her son was currently befriending the Weasley twins, helping them put their luggage on the train.

"Right. Come on, Natalie, Amanda, we haven't got all day for your father to force us through traffic. Wave to Terry and let's leave."

"'Kay. 'Bye, Terry," they chorused, waving. Terry waved back and disappeared into the train. James pulled Lily through the barrier. Amanda and Natalie absent-mindedly walked back through it.

"Did you see him?" Lily demanded when they were on their way home again. "Did you see Harry?"

"Uh, Mum, we were all standing right there," Amanda said in a 'no-duh' tone of voice. "We saw, believe me."

"Isn't he amazing?" James asked. "Now, if he were in Quidditch, I'd see him as a Seeker, no doubt. He's got the right build—he's not too tall, not too heavy…he'd be perfect."

"My husband the Quidditch maniac," Lily complained to the girls. "Your father insists upon raising Quidditch players, even if we're not raising the child himself."

"Can't blame a man for trying."

"Can too!"

**July 31, 1992**

"So, you think Uncle Albus will have anything interesting to tell us about Harry's first year?" Natalie asked Amanda conversationally. Amanda was reading her favorite book again: Redwall, by Brian Jacques. Some of the themes were a little over her nine-year-old head, but she was still fond of the very thick novel.

"Come on. He's a Potter. He's at least got into trouble some way. He hasn't been answering my letters all year, though, so I'm not sure what Harry's done."

"You didn't write to Harry, did you?"

"'Course not, you prat! I wrote to Uncle Albus. Who better?"

"No one really, when you put it that way," Natalie admitted reluctantly. "Almost finished—again? I'm trying to convince Mum to take me to the library. I want to check for that new Tamora Pierce book."

"Oh, you mean the American author you're so fond of?" Amanda asked absently, turning a page in her book.

Natalie nodded and plunked herself down on the edge of Amanda's bed. "The Alanna quartet was good, you have to admit. Even you liked it enough to pitch in, and you're pretty picky when it comes to books you'll actually buy."

"And that quartet was bloody expensive! Four hardcover books. We both had to chip in quite a bit, as I recall."

"Come on, don't be all stuffy. It was only last year. You can 'recall' just fine." Natalie heard the sound of their doorbell ringing. "Come on, mark that page and get downstairs! I think Uncle Albus is here finally!" Amanda sighed, marked the page, and put down the book reluctantly. Natalie pulled her off the bed and yanked her down the stairs.

"Nat! I'm still wearing my ugly shirt," she complained. She was wearing a blindingly violet shirt that did not work with her dyed hair.

"I don't know why you even own that shirt. It doesn't speak much for fashion," Natalie informed her sister matter-of-factly, who dragged a hand through her waist-length hair to comb out the tangles.

"It's comfortable," Amanda tried to explain as she tugged on the shirt hem, clattering down the stairs. Natalie shrugged, tossing her shorter, shoulder-length hair flippantly and feeling very proud of her blue T-shirt that was really Amanda's. She'd pulled it out of the drawer, not really caring whose it was. She liked to flatter herself that she didn't look half-bad in it.

"Girls, come down here so Uncle Albus will tell us what actually happened during Harry's school year," James called.

After Albus had unfolded the compelling story of Harry's first year, the girls and their parents sat in shocked silence.

"So." Lily said dangerously. "_So_. You couldn't find anyone better than my son to save this Sorcerer's stone of yours? You couldn't find anyone better than an _eleven_-year-old. I don't believe you. I'm sure Severus could have gone through just fine, or Flamel himself. You could have sent _James_ through it, and he would not have almost died. But no, you chose to encourage an eleven-year-old to go through the challenges created by multiple adults. I am about ready to go straight to my sister's and demand that my son comes to live with me. If you weren't sitting in front of me right now telling me I cannot, I would go immediately." She was trembling with unconcealed rage. James took her hands in his and made her look at him. Somehow this calmed the furious Mrs. Potter. She took a deep breath.

"Sorry, Albus. I'm sure it wasn't entirely your fault," she said courteously, her voice controlled. "Would anyone else like something to drink?"

"Yes, please, Mum," Amanda said, pointing to Natalie to indicate both of them. "Thanks." She turned toward Albus. "So, did you or didn't you basically make Harry want to go there?"

"I really didn't. I'd just noticed where he'd been and found his invisibility cloak—James's invisibility cloak. I surmised that he would go to search for the stone and left the boy his cloak with a note—he didn't know it was me at the time. I told him to use it well, which I'm sure you would have written as well, James."

James was stony-faced, unforgiving, "I thought Hogwarts was supposed to be safe," he groused. "Instead my son comes face-to-face with Voldemort himself. Albus, why?"

"I did not know Quentin was Dark, James," Albus defended. "I assure you, if I had, I would never have hired him." James was still a little angry.

"Are you telling me you never do any sort of check on those Defense professors, Albus? The backs of their heads? Their IQ? Their capability to teach?" He stared hard at the Headmaster. "You never even saw Quirrell with his turban off? He could have been carrying around hidden vials of poison! Or Lord Voldemort!"

"I know. I regret my breach of security now, I tell you," Albus said sadly, looking old and wearied. "Had I checked on his background and why he wore the turban, Harry could have been as safe in my domain as he is at his home."

"I warn you, Albus," Lily said severely, reentering and handing each person a glass of ice water. "If that blasted school of yours gets any more dangerous, I'm transferring Harry to Beauxbatons—or at least another school."

"I _am_ sorry, Lily," Dumbledore said honestly. "I truthfully wish I could start the year over and make it a little easier on your son."

"Wishing's not doing anything, is it?" Lily asked, but her bristling time was over. "Thank you for your concern. Would you like some ice cream, Albus?"

"I would!" Natalie said. Amanda took one look at the pale pink frozen confection and shivered. "No strawberry for me. I hate strawberry ice cream." She made a cross with her hands.

"Dad got my favorite this year," Natalie told Albus. "Last year he bought chocolate for her, but she knows I can't stand it."

"And someday, James is going to wise up at the store and buy vanilla ice cream with chocolate and strawberry sauce like I do," Lily said tiredly.

"Hey!"

"Hey what? It's the truth, Prongs," she said.

"So I'm not Muggle," James began heatedly. "That doesn't mean I'm totally eccentric. It's not like I—"

"Used to find traffic interesting," Amanda finished.

"Or don't know my way around the grocery store," Natalie added. James made a face. Albus laughed. It was hard not to take some joy in life around the Potters, who, even having lost their Harry, Sirius, and Meghan, took such an obvious delight in life it was infectious.


	4. 3 Dogs and Hogwarts Letters

**Disclaimer:** Now, would _I_ do something like _that_, dears? I haven't stolen Harry Potter…so obviously I don't own it!

**Previously:** We follow Natalie and Amanda through their twisted childhood and evaluate Harry's first year…On to the story!

**Chapter Three: Dogs and Hogwarts Letters…What Next?**, in which the white sheep of a certain family liberates himself and the family goes shopping.

**July 12, 1993**

"Oh my God!" Lily screamed, throwing down the _Daily Prophet_ as if it had suddenly grown two heads and eight legs. James came running into the room with his shirt in his hands instead of on his back. Natalie and Amanda rushed down the stairs two at a time.

"What the hell is going on?" James asked—more like bellowed. Natalie looked approvingly at her father. "Pardon my French," he muttered. Amanda elbowed Natalie.

"Sirius—" her breathless mother squeaked. "Trouble!"

"Who's in serious trouble?" Amanda asked, worried. "This, ah, isn't about the pink hair dye me and Natalie snuck into Dad's shampoo bottle—is it?"

"That was _you_?" James exploded. "Do you girls know how long it took me to get that nasty color out of my hair?"

"Um, yes actually, we do. But who's in serious trouble, Mum? Was it in the paper?" Natalie picked the paper off the floor and looked at the front page. Her face paled drastically and she mutely handed the _Prophet_ to James. The irate father took one look at the paper, and his face rearranged itself into a mask of wonderment. Amanda was tapping her foot on the floor.

"Would anyone _mind_ telling me exactly what is going on?" she demanded. Natalie looked at her twin and found her voice. "Uncle Sirius is out," she said.

Amanda was struck dumb. Natalie quickly attempted to plug her ears, knowing that the stupor wouldn't last for long. "You are so bleeding kidding me!" she screeched, finding her loud voice—and her louder scream—in a split second. "He's broken out of Azkaban? How is that bleeding possible?"

"Language, Amanda Meghan," Lily said automatically. "And how do you think it's possible? He probably used Padfoot, don't you think, James?"

"Would make sense," James said, shoving arms into the sleeves of his shirt. "Looks like I'll have another mission," he added. "Chasing my best friend wherever he may go." _Hope he finds my little sister. Without a wand. She'll kill him if she has one._

"It says—says here that he's supposedly going after Harry Potter…'trustworthy sources informed your Daily Prophet reporter that Black has been muttering in his sleep for a while now. Black has allegedly been repeating, "He's at Hogwarts, he's at Hogwarts."' Wow, you deserve a gold star. There's a lot of people at Hogwarts, but you're right, Harry is one of them. 'One can only assume he means Harry Potter,' because you're such an awful biased writer and want him to be a damned tragic hero—no, that's not really what it says, Dad—'since Black was charged with the betrayal of Harry, Lily, and James Potter's location to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named in the days before his downfall.' Oh, shut up, you idiots, you don't know what you're talking about. 'The public is reminded that Black is extremely dangerous. He was sent to Azkaban for murdering thirteen people with just one curse.' Who wrote this piece of rubbish?" Natalie checked. "Oh, no wonder. It just _screams_ Rita Skeeter."

"Now, now, let's not be too mean to the old gossip Queen," James chided. "While she may be annoying and often biased, she is the best writer they've got. She's got a rather, umm, _fresh_ writing style, though." Lily picked up the paper and started to read the article.

"What trash," she said angrily. "Not once does the article mention all of Sirius's good deeds and qualities, and it's linking him back with Regulus, who was a known Death Eater, and his family, and all that sort of thing. It's low and biased even for Skeeter." She threw down the paper. "I can't read any more." She looked up at her daughters as she changed the subject. "How long has it been since we dyed your hair last?" Amanda shrugged. Natalie bent her head forward for inspection.

"Judging by what I saw in the mirror this morning, a while ago," she said honestly. "We should be redoing pretty soon…I think my roots are already showing, which is just great. We've got a play date with Alyssa in forty-five minutes."

"Hmm…are you _sure _a glamour won't suffice?"

"Fine, fine, but only 'til we get home. I don't want someone to feel the magic and take it off. You can take off hair dye with that one charm, and we'd be _so_ busted." Amanda relented after Natalie's straightforward statement and a hand was laid on her arm.

"Be brave, 'Manda," Natalie joked. "It's only hair, after all," Amanda supposedly agreed with her sister, who shook her head vehemently.

"Hair is _very_ important. I happen to have reasonably nice hair, and I would like to keep it that way, not be tearing it out with anxiety.

"Are you going to chase Uncle Sirius?" Natalie asked James suddenly, changing the subject at the speed of light.

"Not really. If I were to _chase _him, chase him, I would probably be able to track him down. I know all his favorite hideouts, and he'll probably be headed to Hogwarts to see Harry—not kill him, you know Skeeter's insane. So I will _pretend_ I think the search is taking a good trail, and not draw attention to the obvious friendship I had with Sirius."

"Good idea," Lily said fervently.

"Oh, wonderful," Amanda muttered glumly, grabbing a glass and pouring it full of orange juice. "More secrets. My favorite."

"We've got more secrets than a bucket-load of kindergartners," Natalie agreed, also glum. She glanced down at the _Prophet_, seeing her honorary uncle's screaming face and the headline, **Impossible Defied: Sirius Black Escapes Azkaban!**, in large black letters, like jail bars across the page.

BREAK

"Uncle Albus, Uncle Albus!" the girls exclaimed, running down the stairs two and a half weeks later. "Uncle Albus, you're here!" they squealed, opening the door.

The kindly old professor smiled, rather wanly, and hugged each girl separately. "How are you?" he asked courteously.

"Fine. We've just been reading the paper more than usual, is all," Amanda said innocently. Albus winced, just as James rounded the corner into the room.

"Albus, did you, perchance, see the headline of the _Daily_ _Prophet_ about two and a half weeks ago?" he said rather icily. Albus nodded. "Did you then, perchance, think that maybe it would be a good idea to worry about getting my good friend Sirius off the hook? Did you have any thoughts like that, Albus?" Albus nodded again. "Then why haven't you bleeding done anything about it?!" he exploded. Amanda looked at her honorary uncle expectantly.

"Well?" Lily asked, drying her hands on a dishtowel as she entered the room. "Although I don't like James's _language_, my _message_ is the same. We need to focus on getting Sirius off the dangerous criminals list, not on keeping our identity a secret."

"Please, Uncle Albus, I've never even met Uncle Sirius," Natalie pleaded. "Don't you think it would be possible to get rid of all this secrecy so that my uncle can live a _real_ life again?" she demanded. Amanda nodded, backing her sister. Albus sighed heavily.

"I know. I know I should have let you get Sirius out about twelve years ago. I know this shouldn't be that big of a secret. This secretive life will take a toll on Natalie and Amanda as well as on you two. It's already taken a toll on Sirius. I just hope we can find him soon enough to explain."

"I'm not really looking for him, you know," James said honestly. "I have something of an unfair advantage on him." He and his wife traded looks. Albus still didn't know about the Marauders' Animagi forms—or Lily's either (she had become an Animagus the year after graduation, a red tiger). They were really intending to keep it that way.

"So you're risking your job at the Ministry?" Albus asked, surprised. "Is that a safe course of action, James?"

"When it concerns my best friend's soul? Of course it is, Albus!" James bellowed. "I can't just bleeding hand a probably-innocent man over to the dementors without seeing him and talking to him first! Especially when we grew up together! That speaks loads for my conscience, and everything I've ever done!" His eyes were narrowed. "It suggests I actually _care_ about someone's well-being! I actually care about the law being upheld! Is that such a novel concept, Albus?"

"James, take a deep breath and be rational," Lily said, her placid face forced. She put a placating hand on her husband's arm. "We don't need any accidental magic blowing up my living room, thank you very much. Let's all sit down and listen to what Albus has to say, why don't we?" James deflated with a heavy sigh. It actually looked like he was losing whatever had kept him going through his rant.

"Fine, fine," James relented. Amanda opened her mouth, but Natalie put a hand on it from behind. She shook her head at Amanda. _I think we should let him talk, let him explain,_ she thought. _After all, it is mostly his fault Uncle Sirius had to escape in the first place. And he has rather a stupid reason most of the time._

"I'm sorry I've made you four keep so many secrets. You may choose whether or not you'd like to obey me now. I would prefer that you stay undercover. Let me handle the Black case right now. I'll work on getting him a trial. Will that suffice for the moment?" the aging man suggested hopefully. His eyes weren't twinkling.

"For the moment," James acquiesced. Dumbledore nodded, satisfied with his own plan now that the fiery Potter father had supported it. Albus seemed sometimes doubting of himself, although he was undeniably sure of his power and what he could do with it. It was as they said, Natalie reflected. Geniuses did have little to no common sense. She vowed to attempt to keep hers.

"On a lighter note, I've found a Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor this year who _is_ capable of teaching the subject as it should be taught." Albus tried to lighten the mood, rather successfully.

Natalie looked expectantly at him. "Who?" Amanda asked. "Who'd you find that's desperate enough to take a _cursed_ job?" she joked. Her eyes, though, were genuinely curious. Albus smiled.

"A delightful young man named Remus Lupin, who has quite the credentials for the job," Albus winked. James grinned widely.

"A Marauder, teaching," Lily marveled. "Well, who would have thought of it?"

"It would be Remus, though," James disagreed. "He was a perfect _dragon_ for homework when we were in school."

"I remember," Lily said with a reminiscent smile. She loved thinking about the years they'd spent at Hogwarts—however misspent they had been for some. "He was the only one who actually got you to work. He's the reason you passed your classes."

"Aww, but Lily, you got us to work too, remember?" James joked, patting her head mock-condescendingly.

"Only when I got the chance to hex you. I used to think that was the only way to get through your abnormally thick skull," she said good-naturedly. "I suppose I was right." James made a face, but no reply. Albus hid a smile while the twins had a laugh.

BREAK

**August 3, 1994**

"Natalie! Amanda! We're going shopping today!" Lily called up the stairs, wringing her hands as she looked the twins' letters over. "Hogwarts hasn't changed, Lily," James muttered. "It'll be the same list but for the books, you know. Dammit, where the hell did we put the bloody Floo powder?"

"Language, James," she said absently. "It should be on the shelf in the kitchen." James snorted and left the room, muttering something about invisible books—or was that invisible powder? No, it was for a moment. But now he was definitely cussing about some invisible book he'd bought sometime…honestly. Her husband.

"In the shower, Mum!" Amanda yelled back. So _that_ was what the running water she heard was. Natalie, obviously still abed, fell out with a thud. Lily grimaced, and went back to reading the book list.

"Hurry up, 'Manda," she grumbled. "I need one too." A very short while later—although it seemed like forever to foot-tapping Natalie—the shower went off, Amanda quickly dried off and dressed, and the excited girl came down the stairs two-by-two, her dyed brown hair still wet, even though she obviously didn't care.

"Let me glamour you, 'Manda," Lily said critically, seeing where her daughter's telltale black hair was peeping through the Muggle dye at the roots. Amanda frowned. The girls tried not to mess with magic when concerning their appearances, seeing as it was easily interfered with and detected by any suspicious person off the street. "Just until we make it home. Don't have time to dye it now if your father wants to leave soon."

"We've got until Natalie gets out of the shower. Actually, Mum, if it's just my roots. I'll wear something over my head and no one will notice. 'Kay?" Lily nodded. "And then we'll fix it when we get home." She looked up the stairs. "Natalie! Dad wants to leave sometime between now and the next century! And besides, LEAVE SOME WATER FOR THE FISHIES! I think they deserve it," she said wryly, dropping her voice.

"Coming, coming," Natalie yelled, her voice garbled through the water. A few minutes later the water switched off, and Natalie came downstairs just as Lily finished drying Amanda's long, straight hair and Amanda pulled a hat over her head.

"Roots again?" she asked knowingly. Amanda nodded, pulling the rose-pink knit hat down till it was straight down, covering most of her hair. It matched her rose-pink shirt with an artist's palette on it. "How about mine?" she asked, bending her head down for her twin to see. The girl came a little closer to inspect the light-brown locks. They were thoroughly brown, though, and not a hint of black showed. Amanda shrugged and nodded.

"Nah, not yet. Yours showed more recently than mine did. So you had a touchup more recently." Natalie nodded, let her mother cast a drying charm on her head, and ran a hand through her hair. "Let's go out and face the big, bad wizarding world, shall we?" Amanda said with a smile.

"And let's hope Dad can find the Floo powder," Lily muttered, rather resignedly. "Honestly, we use it every day. I do not know how he keeps going to work if he always misplaces the flowerpot."

James came into the room, holding the elusive flowerpot with a sheepish smile on his face. "It was on the shelf we use to keep it on in the kitchen," he confessed.

"_What _did I tell you?" Lily said tiredly. Honestly. Men could be so dense most of the time. "Amanda, you go first. Then James, Natalie, and I'll go last, okay?"

In reply, Amanda stepped up and grabbed a pinch of powder. She tossed it into the fire, stepped in the now-green flames, and called, "Diagon Alley!" in a firm voice. She whirled away instantaneously. She landed on her bottom, of course. There was not a born Potter who could make a decent Floo landing. It was something in their genetics that Lily despaired of.

The other three quickly whirled through. Tom the bartender in the Leaky Cauldron quickly recognized them. He gave them a quick smile, Natalie and Amanda waved, and then they were out near the Alley. James opened the Alley and the four of them strode purposefully in. It resealed itself behind them, and they progressed slowly past the first few shops of Diagon Alley.

"Let's see, where to first?" Lily checked the list, brushing her long blonde hair out of her eyes. "We'll save Ollivander's for last, of course…hmm, why don't we hit Flourish and Blott's first, and then Madam Malkin's?"

"Sounds good to me," Natalie volunteered. Amanda nodded. Lily smiled wryly and turned James away from the path to Quality Quidditch Supplies—or was it Gambol and Japes? It was wherever he always headed to when they journeyed to Diagon Alley. "We're heading for Flourish and Blott's, dear, not the joke shop," she told him firmly, wheeling him into the store a few minutes later. James protested feebly, but let her steer him. He was good that way.

"Natalie, Amanda, get your books. You already know every single one on the list." The twins obediently scrambled to find their books. They assembled them all very quickly, as they had memorized the list. Much to James's chagrin, the prankster girls were also avid readers. Which, as much as he hated to admit it, gave them quite a few, shall we say, _original_ ideas. As soon as they bought the books, Amanda tried to surreptitiously open one, but Lily saw, and said, "No looking at the books until we get home, girls. James, shrink it please. I don't want them to ruin the appeal of their schoolbooks before they even make it back to the house."

When the man simply stared into space, Lily whacked him and repeated her command. James compliantly shrunk the stacks of books until he could put them in his pocket, ignoring Amanda and Natalie as they made puppy-dog eyes. Then they walked to the Apothecary, Lily's earlier promise to attend Madam Malkin's forgotten. Amanda and Natalie exchanged looks and decided not to press the issue. They'd get there eventually. Even if eventually was a long wait. None of them noticed the black dog who brushed through an alley only about twenty meters away. There wasn't much to be said for Potter eyesight, aided or not, unless it dealt with Quidditch. And Lily wasn't looking that way.

BREAK

" 'Students may find dress robes useful'?" Lily read. She smiled, traded a knowing look with James, an Auror, and told Madam Malkin to fit Amanda and Natalie for dress robes as well. Amanda chose soft green and Natalie soft pink. Lily and James knew about the Triwizard…but neither of them expected their daughters to go to the Yule Ball. But, as Lily said, "A girl always needs a good pair of dress robes."

Laden down with packages, however small they were, James sat in the corner of the shop, grumpily reading Quidditch Throughout the Ages. When the girls finally announced to their father that it was time to leave, he jumped up, jubilant. "Thank GOD!" he exclaimed. "I hate coming here with you girls," he added feelingly.

"Mum, you said we could possibly get an owl…" Amanda suggested hopefully. Natalie nodded excitedly next to her. The family owl, Georgia, was getting on in years and emotionally attached to Lily. The connection was mutual. The twins had been flat-out refused when they requested the owl. And of course, James and Lily's work owl was off-limits.

"Oh, all right," Lily said with a smile. "Next stop, Eyelops." The twins smiled widely. James put a hand to the side of his face and sighed resignedly. _Animal-lovers,_ he groaned inwardly.

In Eyelops, the twins found a beautiful barn owl that they immediately fell in love with. "We should call her Morgana," Natalie voted as they left the animal emporium. Amanda nodded, pleased with the name. Lily shook her head, smiled crookedly at her daughters' choice, and led the family toward Ollivander's.

The old man with the pale eyes puzzled over Lily and James's identity for a moment, before turning his attention to the girls. Natalie went first, because she was younger—although that had never made sense to her except when they went out for ice cream.

"Wand hand?"

"Er, right," she said, a little nervously. As she watched the measure flitting around her body, taking very strange measurements, Mr. Ollivander searched for the right wand. He handed her a few, one at a time, only to snatch them away as if they immediately set off a bad vibration in the wand-maker's ancient, creaking bones. "Try this one," he said triumphantly. "Mahogany and dragon heartstring, eleven and a half inches, nice and flexible." It gave her a good result, she was going to get it, and then it was Amanda's turn.

"Wand hand?"

"Ambidextrous." Amanda had taught herself how to write with her left hand after breaking her wrist in the twins' tae-kwon-do class (the girl had been oddly interested in self-defense classes). Now she was as neat with her left as with her right, a fact of which she was very proud.

"Well, Miss McDonald, a twin _and_ ambidextrous! Quite a challenge for any wand-maker! But I assure you; you will certainly have one before the hour is out. I have no doubt of it. Hmm….How about this one?"

It seemed to take longer than that. It was ages upon ages before he finally pulled out what must have been the last wand in the shop. Amanda suppressed a yawn and watched him.

"Tricky customer, eh?" he chuckled, rather sinisterly. "Try this one. Ebony and unicorn hair, twelve inches. Pliable." And it favored her. Mr. Ollivander seemed thrilled with the outcome, and the Potters quietly left the shop, Lily holding the wands "for safekeeping".

BREAK

Back in the Leaky Cauldron, the family grabbed some lunch. James was talking to Tom, Lily to a friend from work named Nadine Dawlish—her brother was an Auror. The twins were talking a bit half-heartedly, taking peeks over their shoulders to see who the people inside were today.

A brunette woman who looked to be in her mid-thirties noticed Amanda looking at her over Natalie's shoulder and winked at her. The girl smiled shyly back, thinking she recognized the woman. If only she looked different…with a different color hair. Natalie noticed her smile and turned around in her seat to stare at the brunette, whose brilliant blue eyes sparkled with mischief. When the four false hazel eyes met the pair of sapphire blue, Natalie gasped.

She whirled back around. The woman looked a little confused and hurt. Amanda tore her gaze away from the strangely familiar woman to glare at Natalie.

"What did you do that for?" she demanded in a whisper. "You're hurting the feelings of someone we haven't even met!" Natalie groaned and threw her head back in exasperation before leaning closer to her sister.

"No, we haven't met her. But look at her eyes again, Amanda," Natalie said, also in a whisper. Amanda rolled her own eyes, sick of her mysterious, rude, annoying, obnoxious, evil, you name it, sister. "You've seen those eyes before, just like I have." Amanda didn't move. "Well, go on! Look, Amanda! Honestly, someone's got to have sense around here. Otherwise we'd probably all be dead. Just bloody look!"

Amanda looked, then turned back to her twin. "I don't see anything, Natalie. I think you need your prescription changed, because your vision's going down the tubes as it is. Now you're, umm, not quite sane, I believe. There's nothing strange about the woman's eyes. Sure we've never seen her before. But is that really a reason to act so crazy? Mental hospital…" Natalie huffed and shook her head. How _could_ she be so _stupid_? It was so _annoying_! Unbeknownst to her, Amanda was thinking the same thing.

"You dirty great prat! Just look again!"

"There's nothing but a pair of eyes, Natalie! You look again!" Natalie rolled her eyes and leaned halfway across the table so she could whisper under her breath, very quietly.

"Amanda Meghan, those are _Aunt_ Meghan's eyes," she muttered. James had finished talking to Tom, and heard her whisper. The glass of pumpkin juice in his hand fell to the ground from his suddenly slack grip. It shattered into a thousand pieces as he whirled around in his chair.

Sure enough, there was a pair of sapphire blue eyes that threw him back into the memories he had long given up on—memories of his childhood. What could this mean? Had he been—he hardly dared to think about it—right about his sister?

BREAK

A/N: Well, I'M BAAAACK!

Betcha missed me. And I even gave you a cliffy even if it's a wimpy one.

Or not. I mean maybe ya didn't miss me…

CaptainHShort: Well…review again if you'd like, and we can argue some more…But thanks for your insight…And for anyone else who wonders, the people who died for Harry genuinely cared for him, and who else but a caring mother figure would give her life for Harry? You may just be hearing some more on that topic later as it may have something to do with Lily and our beloved Uncle Albus!

Shinigami: OF COURSE ALL HELL WILL BREAK LOOSE!!! But while we wait for it, Dumbledore's manipulated them into thinking whoops, better not do anything he doesn't want us to…get the picture? Thanks for reviewing

Julianne Q. Grey: I LOVE Redwall…that's why it's in here. Thanks for the compliment…

Okay, that's out of the way. Not that I didn't want to do that. I'm having fun here!

Meghan would like to comment that I wrote the next chapter of my own volition and she was not present during the writing process. Any problems and/or flames should come directly to me. My little sister would also like to announce that she has a new yellow outfit and a yellow shirt that says Little Miss Sunshine. She's shown me three times, so I thought you might wanna know too.

I'm outta here. Everyone better enjoy this. I fought off an overenthusiastic three-year-old for the right to work on this.

Lotsa luv and even more luck,

LysPotter


	5. 4 Family Reunions

**Disclaimer:** _IF_ I were so lucky as to own Harry Potter, well, maybe the wireless on my computer would work. I'd have enough money to buy a new one if it didn't, so I wouldn't have this problem. This should be your first clue. I _don't_ own Harry Potter. I'm not even JKR…Get it? Got it. Good.

**Warnings: **Language. Little other warnings. Possible mention of Sirius-bashing.

**Previously**_"There's nothing but a pair of eyes, Natalie! You look again!" Natalie rolled her eyes and leaned halfway across the table so she could whisper under her breath, very quietly._

"_Amanda Meghan, those are Aunt Meghan's eyes," she muttered. James had finished talking to Tom, and heard her whisper. The glass of pumpkin juice in his hand fell to the ground from his suddenly slack grip. It shattered into a thousand pieces as he whirled around in his chair._

_Sure enough, there was a pair of sapphire blue eyes that threw him back into the memories he had long given up on—memories of his childhood. What could this mean? Had he been—he hardly dared to think about it—right about his sister?_

**Chapter Four: Family Reunions—My God, the Pain, the Pain!**

No. It wasn't Meghan.

If it wasn't Meghan, who was it? His sensible inner voice was trying to reason with him. Who else had eyes that shade of blue? Who else had that look that spoke of mischief but could turn so solemn in a minute? He shook his head, trying to clear it, and finally was able to take his gaze from the mesmerizing blue. He helped Tom clear up the mess he'd made.

"Sorry, Tom, I really am," he apologized hurriedly, accepting a cloth from the man and drying up the juice he'd spilled.

"Don't worry about it, Andrew," he said good-naturedly. "Everyone knows you're clumsy." Lily laughed, not having heard the comment about Meghan.

"Messy as his hair, too, that one." James winced, while Nadine Dawlish chuckled. Natalie had closed her eyes resignedly.

"She's going to get it now," Amanda said to no one in particular. Everyone assumed she meant Lily—or Anne, but she meant that Meghan would understand it now.

BREAK

Meghan Aletha Black had seen the intense look of the bored girl penetrate her eyes. There was something familiar about her face. She couldn't place it, but assumed she had once known the child's mother or father. She winked at the girl, who smiled, rather shyly.

Then the girl's sister had turned around. She could tell they were twins in an instant. They looked about eleven, and she would have been willing to bet that they were here to buy school supplies. The sister had whirled back around. Meghan couldn't figure out why. She didn't look that scary. All she'd done was to charm her black hair brown. She looked pretty normal. And her hair wasn't bad-looking in itself. It was the same hair her daughter Ashley had. Ashley, on a play date with her friend Ginny Weasley, had left her mother to do her school shopping for her third year, discarding her company for the more favorable company of her friend.

She thought about the possible places she could recognize the faces from. One option was that she'd seen one of their parents at the elder generation of Potters' parties. Another option was she'd once worked with one of their parents, as she was an Auror. Another option was that they'd gone to school together. The last option was that their parents had been some random people off the street that she'd once happened to make eye contact with. She ticked the last one off. They were too familiar-looking for that.

The man sitting next to the sister of the first girl—presumably their father—dropped his glass of pumpkin juice and spun around. His hair was a disaster. He was brown-haired, blue-eyed, and rather good-looking. He looked like someone she worked with. McDonald, she thought. Not totally handsome, but not ugly. He wasn't as good-looking as Sirius.

No. Sirius, the only man she'd really ever thought she'd love, had turned out to be a no-good, dirty traitor after her brother, sister-in-law, and nephew. The father of her child, her husband. He'd been just another Death Eater. Her fist clenched. She turned her attention back to the man.

The man was more than workplace-familiar, she admitted. Very familiar. Just not like that. His facial structure reminded her of someone.

"Sorry, Tom, I really am," he apologized. Meghan cocked her head, positioning her ear closer to the man. His voice was perfectly familiar too. No…

"Don't worry about it, Andrew," Tom the bartender said. Meghan leaned forward. His name was Andrew?

The blonde woman sitting across from him laughed. "Messy as his hair, that one," she said in a voice that was also perfectly familiar. Meghan fell back in her chair. She'd never thought she'd hear those voices again, not in a million years. Her eyes opened to their fullest extent. If those weren't James and Lily Evans Potter's voices, she'd—she'd eat her quill.

But it wasn't possible. She'd seen them. She'd seen the dead bodies. She'd felt how cold they were. She'd torn the house apart for her nephew. She'd howled in her grief, breaking apart. How could it be? Her brother, her sister-in-law, murdered in one fell swoop? How could it have been? And now she thought these two people were the two she'd missed for nearly thirteen long years? But that wouldn't be possible! No one rose from death…No. It wasn't them.

"She's going to get it now," the first girl said tiredly. For a moment, Meghan almost thought she was talking about her, but then realized she was probably talking about her mother. The woman who couldn't be Lily. Her father looked behind him again. The man who couldn't be James.

BREAK

There she was. The woman that couldn't be Meghan. And she was staring at him. Like she knew who he was. He'd torn it. He turned back.

"Thanks for everything, Tom," he said in an overly loud voice, trying not to look suspicious but managing to anyway. "We should be going now."

Nadine told Lily goodbye and Lily told her to bring something technical to work the next day. James wasn't really listening.

Amanda stood up with a sigh that was half relief and half worry. She wanted to leave, but she was afraid of what might happen.

She and Natalie saw what their father was planning and knew instinctively that it would work perfectly. To reach the fireplace to Floo home, they'd have to go right by Meghan. Or the woman who couldn't be Meghan. Your choice.

And so a wary pair of twins, a wondering thirty-seven-year-old, and his oblivious wife stopped at the woman-who-couldn't-be-Meghan's table.

"Hello," James said pointlessly. "I saw you from—you know, I'm the one that dropped my cup. Do I know you from somewhere, miss?"

"You might," she said vaguely. James's eyes widened to epic proportions. The low, dry voice she'd always had echoed through his strangely empty-feeling head. Lily gasped. "I think it might be productive to talk about this outside," she said diplomatically. "I'm finished here, just let me grab my things and we can go talk."

"We…we don't want to impose. If there's somewhere you need to be," Lily said fruitlessly, now understanding what was happening.

"It's no trouble. None at all. I haven't been able to locate many of my old friends. I'm willing to spend a few minutes to see if I know you." _Because you've been hiding from us for thirteen years. You have some explaining to do, young lady. Or not-so-young lady. _James's thoughts were strangely twisting. He wasn't sure what to think. He'd completely forgotten that the Potters had also been hiding for those thirteen years.

Out in front of the Leaky Cauldron, the brunette woman leaned easily on the brick wall, but the family could see that her hand was ready to pull a wand from a hip holster, where James had always known his overly suspicious younger sister to keep her wand. Lily tried a smile, but it didn't do anything.

Amanda elbowed her father, who was still trying to straighten out his thoughts. "What?" he said without thinking.

"You thinking about starting to talk sometime this century? You've only got about five and a half years, you know," she said sarcastically.

"Let him take his time, otherwise he'll trip over his tongue and just freak out." Natalie rolled her eyes.

"Girls," he said warningly. "Would you please be quiet. If you don't have anything important to add to the conversation, don't add it."

"There _isn't_ a conversation. If you'd like to start one, go ahead. Or, we'll do it for you." Lily gave them a Look. They didn't even flinch.

"Okay, look, since no one else is inclined to talk—" Natalie began.

"—we'll start for them," Amanda finished.

"We'd like to ask you—"

"—if you were, perchance, named Meghan—"

"—in a past life."

"Please tell the truth—"

"—so we can figure out if Natalie needs her prescription adjusted or not."

"Hey!"

"Well, what did you expect? I am your sister." The woman-who-might-be-Meghan smiled crookedly.

"Well, James, you did a good job on them," she said calmly. "If my assumption is correct, which I'm pretty damn sure it's not, but oh well."

"Well, my assumption is pretty unlikely too, but you seem to have confirmed it," James added. "Seeing as you're not supposed to be alive."

"See! _Now_ there's a conversation."

"Amanda, be quiet," James repeated. "If there's nothing useful you want to add to the current conversation—"

"Don't add it. I got it, Dad. Now, would you mind getting this show on the road? I left a perfectly good book at home."

"If you would be quiet, I might be able to." He looked at his sister. "Well, since we're standing in a Muggle road, I think it might be best if we continued this at our home. Would you care to come with us? If you would, you're very welcome to do so, miss." Meghan laughed, probably at her brother's manners, which were still a novelty to even him.

"Well, of course, kind sir. What, did you think I was just going to let you walk off and not explain anything to me?"

"Well, no. Come on. The…the address is 1202 Cambridge. It's here in London."

"It'd be easier to take the underground," Natalie muttered.

"Keep your comments to yourself, young lady," Lily admonished. Meghan shook her head and laughed again.

"You were made to be a mother, Lily—er, ma'am." Lily smiled at the compliment and herded the arguing twins and their father back into the Leaky Cauldron.

"I told you it'd be easier to take the underground," Natalie kept muttering. Amanda kept elbowing her. "What is it with you and the bleeding underground?" she grumbled.

"Language, Amanda Meghan," James said automatically, thinking that he seemed to have rubbed off on his daughter in that particular area. "Now get in the fireplace, go home, and both of you can go to your room while your mother and I talk to this lovely lady."

"Oh, Andrew, you flatter me," Meghan said mock-bashfully. James tried to think where she'd heard his false name. Then again, it wasn't that hard to master—it was just his middle name, and his sister had heard that plenty of times—and used it too. Amanda and Natalie went through the Floo—in reverse order—then Lily to make sure the house didn't fall down, then the woman-who-was-probably-Meghan, and finally, James. He hoped to God—and Merlin too—that the woman was truly his sister and she believed him.

BREAK

"Have a seat," Lily bustled when Meghan stepped into the house from the fireplace. Meghan noted the clothes that sat newly folded on the couch opposite the one she sat on.

"So, madam, would you really care to introduce yourself?" James asked, dusting himself off and sitting on the newly-folded laundry without a second thought.

"Don't think you'll take Louise Campbell for an answer?" she asked hopefully. James rolled his eyes and Lily fixed her with a glare. "Fine, fine—Meghan Aletha Potter Black."

A shriek was heard from upstairs. "I _told_ you, Amanda Meghan Potter! I _told _you it was Aunt Meghan! But you wouldn't believe me—" Meghan fixed James with a glare of her own.

"Trust me, Natalie, I wasn't trying to deny it, but who was to know that she was alive? She's been dead for thirteen years!"

"In case you haven't been watching the news, so have Mum and Dad!"

"Shut up, I think they might want to tell Aunt Meghan themselves. We're screeching loud enough for Uncle Albus to hear us from Hogwarts."

"Be quiet, girls!" Lily called. "You can come down if you want, because I know you're just going to eavesdrop anyway. Plus we need you to keep quiet. And it's easier to convince you to do such a thing when you're next to us."

The two girls pounded down the stairs. Meghan smiled as they rushed into the room. They sat on either side of the brunette woman.

"_Finite Glamouri_!" Catching Meghan by surprise, Lily's counter-charm floored her brunette glamour, and she was very much raven-haired.

"Unless she has a couple of layers of charms, then I'd say she was really Meghan, Andrew—I mean James," the blonde Lily said matter-of-factly.

Meghan looked at her hands, not sure of what to say. What would she say to explain her actions for the past years? What would she say to explain her daughter? It was almost time for her to Floo back home from the Weasleys. She felt two people pressing up on either side of her. She looked to each side.

"Okay, would either of _you_ care to explain?" she asked them pointedly. The strawberry-blonde-haired girls smiled evil smiles, shook their heads simultaneously, and pointed at their parents. Meghan transferred her hard gaze to her brother and sister-in-law, not losing the power behind it. She was proud of her Evil Look.

"Okay, okay, okay! I'm James Potter—duh, and this is my wife Lily, I'm sure you remember us dear sister. If you don't, I'm going to ask someone to perform a mental health checkup on you. Okay. So, you remember Matt and Mary Arthurs? In the year ahead of me and two years ahead of you? Her maiden name was Smythe. We all three grew up together. He was the one with the brown hair, and she was blonde? They were Gryffindors in Jane's class. But anyway, when Dumbledore figured out that Peter was the spy in the Order and that we weren't safe—" Lily put a carefully-manicured hand over her husband's mouth.

"What James is trying to say is that it wasn't Sirius. He wasn't the spy. He was our Secret Keeper for all of a week, when he decided we should change to Peter, but everyone would think it was him. Like bait," she explained to the shell-shocked woman. "But he didn't have to do that. Peter went to Voldemort of his own free will. He always liked his big, powerful friends to hide behind. But we told Dumbledore when we changed, and Snape figured out that Peter was spying for Voldemort. So we decided to use his plan against him some way."

"Idiotic little bugger. Makes me really mad sometimes," Amanda commented.

"All the time," corrected Natalie.

"Right."

"Girls, let me continue, please. We couldn't figure out any way, but Dumbledore and Mary and Matt had an idea. You know how Mary would baby-sit for Harry when you three were on a mission for Dumbledore or the Ministry and I had to work the late shift?" Meghan nodded. "Well, you see, they agreed to pretend they were us. Unfortunately—Voldemort—Voldemort—"

"He killed them," James said flatly. "He killed them because of that damned prophecy about Harry and it was all our fault. We should have been brave enough to go for it. We should have been brave enough to die for Harry. We should have known he wouldn't stop 'til Harry was dead. It's our fault."

"No, it's not," Amanda contradicted. "They chose to masquerade of their own free will, Dad. They had a choice, and they did what they knew was right. You know it too. Just like Uncle Sirius did what he thought was right, and Aunt Meghan did what she thought was right. Just like Uncle Albus _thinks_ he is doing what he thinks is right. Don't tell him I said that."

"Won't. He's so manipulative most of the time." Natalie sighed. "Sometime I'm going to smash his office until he says I can yell my secret from the top of the Tower."

"I've no doubt that you would," James said wearily. "Just make sure that he says he'll let me get Sirius off when you do, okay?"

"Of course," she said courteously. "I think we've killed Aunt Meghan, though." And sure enough, Meghan had gone ice-pale.

"Are you—are you—you know—you?" She felt a little stupid asking the question, as they obviously were.

"Well, tomorrow is a Thursday…can we do it, Mum?" Amanda asked expectantly. Lily looked thoughtful.

"I think Dad and I will call in sick tomorrow to celebrate this momentous occasion," she decided. "So we'll have ample time for our family conversations if your aunt calls in sick too. You don't have school. Now…It's not the Finite Glamouri, what is that charm to get rid of hair dye? I can never remember it—not that it matters, because we never take it off. Girls, please tell me you remember it."

"Sorry, don't."

Lily walked off to look it up.

When she came back in, she pointed her wand at James's head—he started up—and muttered something no one could hear. It turned black again. Then she pointed it at each of her daughters' heads respectively, effectively darkening their hair to the raven shade no one ever saw. She fixed her hair and pulled the glamour off her eyes. The other three Potters dipped their heads to remove their contacts. When they pulled their heads back up, Meghan saw three pairs of emerald green eyes and one pair of hazel staring at her.

Two of the emerald and the hazel weren't focusing properly, but she didn't care. She nearly threw herself on her brother. "Oy, sis, wait a minute here, I've got these context lenses on my fingers, so if you don't lay off, I'm going to have to buy a new pair. Damn, these things are expensive, too. So lay off a moment so I can go put 'em away and get my glasses." He stood up. "You girls come too. You'll want to _see_, I suppose."

"Would be nice, yeah," Amanda agreed. "Don't do that very often." The girls got up and followed their father.

"Not one of them got my eyesight," Lily lamented. "You get your sorry arse over here, Meghan Aletha Black, and you give me a hug right this very instant, or so help me, I will stick you baby-sitting James for a week, and I _won't_ be paying you. Of course, Amanda and Natalie can help you, but you can get yourself over here anyway."

And with that, the two long-lost friends fell, smiling but weeping, into each other's arms.

When Amanda, glasses pushed as far as possible up on her nose, entered the room, she sighed happily, sat down, and tried to wait patiently for everyone to file back in again.

It took some time, but eventually even James was back from putting away the "context lenses on my fingers" and was hugging Meghan. The two junior Potters (impatiently) waited their turn, hoping to be remembered sometime before the next millennium, which only meant they'd have to be self-sufficient for five and half years, Amanda mused.

"And who are these two lovely ladies who noticed me in the Leaky Cauldron? I have reason to believe that they are named Natalie and Amanda?" Meghan asked.

"I'm Amanda, she's Natalie. The easy way to tell us apart is by our hair. As you can see, I have short hair. She has long hair. It helps, usually."

"I can see that. I assume I'm your aunt, then, and these two aren't just raising you for the heck of it." James shrugged.

"Well, it was raining pretty hard the night they were born," he rationalized. "We could've drowned them instead. But we raised 'em anyway."

"Dad!" Natalie shrieked.

"Yes, Meghan, these are your nieces Amanda and Natalie," Lily stepped in.

"Well, if I'm an aunt again, I think I deserve a hug," Meghan said, mock-affronted. Natalie smiled, and Amanda looked like Christmas had come early.

"Merlin, I've always wanted an aunt," they chorused, causing Meghan to laugh. She stopped laughing when both girls fell to hugging her, and winced instead. The girls had two pairs of very strong arms between them.

Suddenly thinking of something, the twins let go and Amanda said, "I suppose you'd like to know why nothing's happened concerning Uncle Sirius?"

"That would be something to know, yes. Seeing as he was your _best_ friend, James, and he nonetheless spent eleven years in hell-on-earth."

"That's not our fault. Telling what happened with Sirius would have revealed our identities, and Albus wouldn't let us," James protested.

"THEN WHY, IN THE NAME OF MERLIN, DIDN'T YOU JUST FORGET WHAT ALBUS SAID AND TAKE SIRIUS OUT OF BLOODY AZKABAN, JAMES?" Meghan exploded. "Albus? What about Sirius? Your best friend from the cradle! Sirius! My Sirius, the one you knew was innocent from the start and never bothered to let off! You remember when the two of us started holding hands in class, and you got all overprotective? Do you remember the summer before your seventh year? Do you, James? Do you?"

"I do," Lily interrupted. "I remember it, Meghan. I'm sorry. I really, truly am. But we couldn't think of a prudent way to say anything in front of the Ministry, and—"

"So we decided not to say anything at all," James finished. "I know what I did, Meghan. And I kill myself about it every day. If I thought I could fix it just by going in and telling them, I'd do it. Don't you think I would? I've spent the last twelve and a half years thinking about seeing all my old friends again. Including you. I knew you weren't dead. I didn't know where to find you. I knew where to find Sirius. I didn't know anyone who would believe me. Trust me, Meghan, I would have. I would have. But there's no one besides Dumbledore who knows we're alive and believes us."

"Well, you, now," Lily said with a small smile. "Meghan, I know how you feel, but now that we all know that we're alive and that he's innocent, we can focus on finding him."

"Speaking of that, where are _you_ living?" James asked. Meghan shrugged.

"Well, I'm living in an apartment with my daughter, Ashley. Who is supposed to Floo back to our place very soon…she should be arriving any moment and having a heart attack because I wasn't there to meet her. She loaded off all her school shopping on me while she went to go play at the Weasleys. They got Top Box tickets to the Quidditch World Cup. Ashley and Ginny could not stop discussing it for weeks!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Ashley, your daughter. How old is she now?" James demanded.

"Thirteen going on fourteen. Her birthday's August 31st, remember?"

"Hey, we can have a big birthday party on September 30th!" Natalie clapped. Amanda gave her sister a look that said, _Yeah, _you_ can._ She deflated. "Can we meet her?"

"Of course. Let me go pick her up and bring her over. I'll be right back with her." Meghan Apparated away.

BREAK

Arriving at the Blacks' London flat, she noticed that Ashley, far from having a heart attack, was sitting on the couch placidly reading the newspaper and having a cup of tea. Meghan gaped at her daughter.

"When did you get back?"

"Half an hour ago. It's not my fault you're deaf and couldn't hear Mrs. Weasley say one and not one-thirty. In case you were wondering, I told her you were making tea when she Flooed me to make sure I was okay. _I_ was making tea, so she believed me."

"How's Ginny?" Meghan asked chattily.

"Oh, fine. We stayed out of the house, because all the boys were there. Fred, George, Percy, Bill, Charlie, Ron, Harry—"

"Oh, right, he was there for the hols, wasn't he?" Meghan asked absently, brushing Ashley's unruly hair. "Ash, love, what would you say if I told you that you could meet your cousins, aunt, and uncle today and that your dad wasn't guilty after all?" Ashley spun around, spilling tea over the couch as she stood up.

"What the hell are you on about?" she demanded, swearing as some of the hot tea got on her leg. "Dad's guilty and Aunt Lily and Uncle James are dead."

"Language, Ashley Marie," Meghan said tiredly. "Turns out Lily and James are alive. I ran in to them in the Leaky Cauldron, and they're the genuine article, love. And guess what?" Without waiting for a reply, she continued. "You have two more cousins. Twins! And they're starting this year at Hogwarts."

"You're kidding. What is this, August Fool's Day? This is the lamest joke I've ever heard. 'I can't listen to Mrs. Weasley, Ash, but what would you tell me if I said your father was innocent, and you have an aunt, an uncle, and twin cousins besides the one you knew about before?' Ha, ha, Mum, very funny."

"It's not a joke."

"Prove it, then."

"Okay, grab my arm and we'll go right to their living room. Leave the tea here though." She looked down at herself.

"Mum, I need to change," she told her. "I spilled all over my shorts, and I am wearing these now-dirty clothes to a joke over my dead body."

Meghan sighed. "Hurry up then." Ashley zipped into her bedroom, zipped into a new outfit, and zipped back out in record time.

"Nice," Meghan commented. She was wearing a metallic silver tank top with black shorts. It almost exactly matched Meghan's outfit, only her pants were capris. "Grab my arm, we're late."

BREAK

The Blacks materialized in the Potters' living room. Ashley took one look at the people in the room and looked at her mother. "Sorry," she said in a small voice.

"No worries. It was pretty hard to stomach. And nobody warned me, either. I just got plopped right in the middle. Time for introductions and reintroductions."

"Um, hi, Ashley, you won't remember us, but we once knew you. I'm your Aunt Lily, and this is your tongue-tied Uncle James."

"I've only seen pictures," she shrugged. "I've always envied your hair."

"And I've always wanted your mother's," Lily replied. "Two you don't know: Natalie and Amanda. This one's Natalie, that one's Amanda. They're your cousins."

"Hey," Ashley said with a smile.

"Nice shirt," Natalie, ever fashion-conscious, told her cousin.

"Thanks. I like yours too." It was pale yellow with a pink butterfly on it.

"It's my lucky shirt. Matches my lucky socks."

"I see. So you're Amanda, right?"

"Natalie. That's Amanda. Today she's in green, and I'm in yellow. I'm the one with short hair, she's the one with long, even though she's the sporty runner type and I like to worry about clothes and hair, et cetera." The adults edged out of the room, leaving the three girls to talk about anything and everything they wanted to.

"So you're my cousins. I didn't know you existed."

"We knew a little bit about you. Can't learn much in two months, so Mum and Dad didn't have much to say. Just a few good stories about how clumsy Uncle Sirius was when it concerned you. It was pretty obvious that Dad and Mum missed Aunt Meghan, and they thought she maybe was going to come back. But we didn't say anything."

"So when were you born?"

"October thirty-first, 1982," Amanda said. "The one-year anniversary of Aunt Mary and Uncle Matt's death. Dad thinks it's an omen; Mum thinks we got lucky." Natalie shrugged, picking it up where Amanda had left off. "We're not sure what to think." She looked at Ashley, then noticed the adults had left. "Let's pull one on them. Let's go up to our room. Wish we could bring Auntie up, but they're talking in the kitchen.

"Here's our room," Amanda said two rounds of questions later. They had been detained on the stairs to look at the family pictures. Ashley had been amused by her mother's, a childhood print of Meghan with pink hair, a prank played by James. That had led to a round of questions about the early childhood of the _new_ Potters.

"Thanks, um, Amanda," she said with a smile. "You two are going to take some getting used to. Nice decorations. Who put up the flowers?"

"Me."

"Thought so. It doesn't exactly seem your type, Amanda. Now. Mum is going to want to get back at Uncle James for that picture. Should we turn the prank back on him?"

"Well, no, you can't do the pink hair. We did that last year," said Amanda reasonably. "You could try…hmm, classic, but original, Natalie, what do we have?"

"Well, there's fifteen thousand variations on the water over the bed prank. But then you'd get Mum, too, and she gets upset very easily by pranks."

"I know. Mum played some on her during school, and she said she can scold better than my grandma. She knows about us." Amanda, even not knowing her grandmother, nodded heartily.

"After we got over Uncle Sirius finally getting out of there—we'll have to ask what took him so long—she grounded us for two weeks about the hair dye thing. Dad was strutting around the house for the whole two weeks," she recalled. "I hate it when he does that." Natalie sat down on her bed, inviting the girls to sit down with her. Pranks forgotten, they moved on, to better things.

"I want to know…Do any of your friends know who you really are?" Ashley asked.

"Are you crazy? No! I mean, Lyssa would do her nut, Emma would look up everything and tell us it's not possible, and Anna—she wouldn't speak to us for a month! Mary Elizabeth…well, you know Mary," she directed at her sister.

"Yeah. She wouldn't turn a hair. She'd just start asking about Harry or some such thing. She reminds me of what Mum and Dad have said about Sybill Trelawney sometimes. She says her favorite cousin is just like her. Mary's cousin, I mean. Mary Lovegood's. Her cousin's name is…I don't know, something with the moon. Moona I think."

"It's Luna. She's in my year, she hangs out with Ginny and I. Very interesting person, Luna. She has secrets about the most interesting animals. What say you I take you around when we get to Hogwarts? Ginny and Luna would love to help."

"I just want some tips to get to classes on time and the way to the Quidditch pitch to go run in the morning," Amanda said.

"You run? Play any sports?"

"Not really. Played two seasons of soccer, decided I didn't like it, and went for track and field instead. I prefer cross-country, but the team makes you wait until eighth year around here. I would have joined ages ago."

"Maybe you and I can have a race sometime," Ashley said. "I play soccer for fun during the hols. Do a lot of running with that."

"Cool. I'd like a race sometime. Now why don't we go see what's taking the adults so long? Dad's probably having trouble saying what he wants to say. I know he's been a little tongue-tied since we found your mum."

And even as they said that, Meghan was sitting at the Potters' kitchen table explaining what had happened to her instead of the death that was thought to have happened.

"Narcissa Malfoy came to duel with me. I was crying, holding Ashley obviously, in the ruins of your lovely house. I heard her coming and put Ashley up in the bedroom. Your bedroom was less destroyed than any other room in the house. Then I went down to face Narcissa.

"I don't know how, but her eyes were flat, cold, not the bright blue they used to be. She was going to see me dead if it was the last thing she did. It was like she was a whole different person. So we dueled to see who would make it out of the house. I'd been crying, I wasn't up to form. She was above form. So she ended up beating me. I made it next to Ashley before I collapsed.

"It's a wonder we both didn't die, really. It was cold, and all I had on were the clothes on my back. Ashley was under the covers, but she was only two months old. She didn't have any food at all for two days after that. When I woke up, my death 'without a trace' had already been wired through the whole world and I was still in no shape to go claim that I was living to the Ministry. I poked around in your cupboards until I found something to eat. When Ashley was fed, we were headed for town.

"As soon as I figured out everyone thought I was dead, I was glad I was wearing a hat. I was _not_ ready to face the Ministry and the rest of the world and tell them I wasn't dead yet, especially since Sirius was arrested and my married name wasn't looking too good at the moment. So I got us to Mum and Dad, who both heard me out. Then I grabbed everything I needed out of our little house. I couldn't live there without Sirius. Even if he was scum, I didn't believe he was evil, not even then. It was like…I didn't hate him. It was like someone had told me the sky had gone all pink and it was raining fire, but not allowed me to look at it. Everywhere I went, there was no analysis of the fight and arrest. They were all just sure it was him, so sure that they were willing to report me when I said maybe he was innocent. So I settled down in London to raise Ashley. I wrote to Gryffindor Manor, kept a journal, laughed with my daughter. And I cried with the door shut."

BREAK

A/N:

And so, Meghan reenters the story!!!! YAY we all anticipated this moment…right? If you are not acquainted with Meghan's actions and personality, check out PFTP: Change or LADL: A Secret Kept. Both portray her in more detail than this. A physical description: She has black hair, blue eyes, and a very mischievous look. She is tall and slender and quite tan. As Louise Campbell, you will have noted that she is the same but for brown hair. An abstract description: Few people are as mischievous as Meghan, and she truly endeavors to make as much trouble as possible. Okay, that's Meghan in a nutshell!

M: (thumps against nutshell) Lys Terri Potter! You let me out right this very instant young lady!

LP and A: (snicker)

LP: That's okay, Meggie! You can have a nice visit in there!!

Back on track. Hypocritical b that I am, I appreciate reviews!!

With love,

LysPotter xox

IN NEXT CHAPTER:

A revised edition of N&A's story, changed especially for a reviewer's comment that James and Lily weren't getting enough grief about abandoning Harry. I agree, but now I have to buckle down and write it. Look forward to some explosive Meghanistic scolding. It's a blast, honest!

With more love,

LysPotter xox


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